https://phys.org/biology-news/ecology en-us The latest science and research news on ecology Polar bears are icons of the Arctic, elusive and vulnerable. Detailed monitoring of their populations is crucial for their conservation—but because polar bears are so difficult to find, we are missing critical data about population size and how well-connected those populations are. Scientists have now developed a new tool to help: DNA analysis using skin cells shed in the bears' footprints in the snow. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-polar-footprints-dna-tracks-threatened.html Ecology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 04 Dec 2023 00:00:01 EST news620633915 James Cook University researcher Matthew Connors has discovered two new praying mantis species with the help of citizen scientists. The finds have been published in Zootaxa. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-citizen-scientists-mantis-species.html Plants & Animals Ecology Fri, 01 Dec 2023 10:18:00 EST news620648278 As a result of climate change, the Golden State's farms are expected to face a surge in agricultural pests, which poses a threat to California's specialty crops industry. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-climate-surge-insects-almonds-peaches.html Ecology Agriculture Fri, 01 Dec 2023 09:06:27 EST news620643983 Born tail first, bottlenose dolphin calves emerge equipped with two slender rows of whiskers along their beak-like snouts—much like the touch-sensitive whiskers of seals. But the whiskers fall out soon after birth, leaving the youngster with a series of dimples known as vibrissal pits. Recently, Tim Hüttner and Guido Dehnhardt, from the University of Rostock, Germany, began to suspect that the dimples may be more than just a relic. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-bottlenose-dolphin-weak-electric-fields.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 18:00:01 EST news620582542 New research from Northern Arizona University has explained coast redwood's remarkable ability to recover from very severe fire, a rare sign of optimism amid a landscape increasingly scarred by severe fires. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-cautious-resilience-redwoods.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 17:31:03 EST news620587861 By studying the skull shapes of dipsadine snakes, researchers at The University of Texas at Arlington have found how these species of snakes in Central and South America have evolved and adapted to meet the demands of their habitats and food sources. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-snake-skulls-species-prey.html Evolution Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 15:28:03 EST news620580481 Animals often use vocalizations to warn of nearby danger to others. While this information is generally intended for members of the same species, other species can eavesdrop on the warnings to use the information for their own benefit. Sentinels are animals that have warning calls so widely understood by others that those other species will form groups with them, relying on the sentinels to provide warnings of danger. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-sentinel-universally-understood-continents.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 15:16:55 EST news620579812 A new study of a migratory songbird shows that individuals with average-sized white tail spots—a trait that is critical to successful foraging—live longer than individuals with more extreme amounts of white in the tail. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-migratory-songbird-link-white-tail.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 13:18:51 EST news620572729 Ana Mateos and Jesús Rodríguez, scientists at the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH), have published a paper in the journal Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology showing that large herbivore carrion, a resource that had formerly been abundant and accessible to hominins, became scarcer at the end of the Early Pleistocene due to changes in the Iberian fauna. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-turnover-iberian-fauna-availability-carrion.html Ecology Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 30 Nov 2023 11:59:15 EST news620567953 There's a species of ant that is so rare, only a handful of records exist from across the entire eastern United States. North Carolina State University researcher Michelle Kirchner not only found these ants in the Triangle region of North Carolina, she is the first to document an entire colony for scientists, taxonomists and ant-thusiasts everywhere. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-rare-ant-species-rediscovered-north.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 11:58:12 EST news620567889 Agriculture, like other sectors of the economy, is a profit-driven business. Simple cultivation systems such as monocultures have therefore become firmly established, because they promise higher returns. However, they are more susceptible to diseases and parasites, which can cause total crop failure among other things. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-world-suitable-diversified-farming-sustainable.html Ecology Agriculture Thu, 30 Nov 2023 09:56:03 EST news620560561 In a study published in Current Biology, researchers from the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, together with their collaborators, reveal a groundbreaking discovery: Morphology of the orchid mantis' petal-shaped femoral lobes actually serves as structures for gliding, rather than the long-held belief that these lobes mimic flowers to attract pollinating prey. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-orchid-mantises-petal-shaped-femoral-lobes.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 08:31:16 EST news620555473 We humans are fixated on big brains as a proxy for smarts. But headless animals called brittle stars have no brains at all and still manage to learn through experience, new research reveals. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-brittle-stars-fine-brain.html Plants & Animals Ecology Thu, 30 Nov 2023 06:27:05 EST news620548017 Farmland often harbors a multitude of pathogens which attack plants and reduce yields. A Swiss research team has now shown that inoculating the soil with mycorrhizal fungi can help maintain or even improve yields without using additional fertilizers or pesticides. In a large-scale field trial, plant yield increased by up to 40%. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-inoculating-soil-mycorrhizal-fungi-yield.html Ecology Agriculture Wed, 29 Nov 2023 12:52:39 EST news620484756 A team of evolutionary biologists and limnologists affiliated with multiple institutions in the U.S. has described the synchronous bioluminescent signals they observed being produced by a type of marine ostracod (Crustacea; Luxorina). In their paper published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the group describes their study of the synchronized mating behavior of the tiny creatures. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-sea-firefly-ostracods-synchrony-bioluminescent.html Plants & Animals Ecology Wed, 29 Nov 2023 11:10:01 EST news620478027 A new study has confirmed that pesticides, commonly used in farmland, significantly harm bumblebees—one of the most important wild pollinators. In a huge study spanning 106 sites across eight European countries, researchers have shown that despite tightened pesticide regulations, far more needs to be done. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-bees-tightened-pesticide.html Ecology Agriculture Wed, 29 Nov 2023 11:00:01 EST news620476151 Biodiversity—the total variation of life—is multidimensional. Its study encompasses multiple facets, such as taxonomy (the variety of species), phylogenetics (their evolutionary history) and functionality (the ecological roles that species play in ecosystems). Protecting biodiversity implies safeguarding all of these dimensions. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-highly-threatened-sharks-rays-inadequate.html Plants & Animals Ecology Wed, 29 Nov 2023 10:27:41 EST news620476059 A new Griffith-led study has developed a framework to operationalize global "theories of change," coordinating local and global actions to secure a future where humans live in harmony with nature. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-global-theories-tangible-ecosystems.html Ecology Wed, 29 Nov 2023 09:31:04 EST news620472662 A new study from the University of Southampton sheds light on the impact climate change is having on marine environments in a relatively recent global phenomenon known as "tropicalization." https://phys.org/news/2023-11-global-marine-life-due-sea.html Evolution Ecology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 17:04:04 EST news620413441 Living systems—unlike non-living or inanimate objects—use information about their surrounding environment to survive. But not all information from the environment is meaningful or relevant for survival. The subset of information that is meaningful, and perhaps necessary for being alive, is called semantic information. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-theory-semantic-realistic-survival.html Ecology Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 16:52:03 EST news620412721 Diverse ecosystems support the web of life and in the process, provide food, water, medicine and materials for humanity. But the butterfly effect tells us all things are connected. So, when biodiversity loss threatens the foundation upon which we live, what does that mean for the future of Earth and humanity? https://phys.org/news/2023-11-biodiversity-space-borne-lidar.html Ecology Biotechnology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 12:34:55 EST news620397292 A pair of environmental and life scientists, one with the University of Newcastle, in Australia, the other the German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research, has found that one species of mosquito native to Australia targets only the noses of frogs for feeding. In their paper published in the journal Ethology, John Gould and Jose Valdez describe their three-year study of frogs and Mimomyia elegans, a species of mosquito native to Australia. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-australian-mosquito-species-frogs-noses.html Plants & Animals Ecology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 12:33:46 EST news620397223 The slash-and-burn agriculture practiced by many Indigenous societies across the world can actually have a positive impact on forests, according to a new study done in Belize. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-slash-and-burn-agriculture-forest-biodiversity.html Ecology Agriculture Tue, 28 Nov 2023 11:56:04 EST news620394961 A team of zoologists, environmental scientists, marine biologists and life scientists affiliated with several institutions in Ireland and the U.K. has found that despite international bans, persistent organic pollutants (POPs) continue to be both widespread and pervasive in the environment, including the world's oceans. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-years-persistent-pollutants-threat-marine.html Plants & Animals Ecology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 10:13:38 EST news620388816 According to current knowledge, individuality is determined by either differences in genome or in the apparent environmental conditions. However, studies show, the paradigm of twin research is currently crumbling. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-clonal-fish-genes-environment.html Evolution Ecology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 09:25:03 EST news620385901 Tetrodotoxin, the neurotoxin that makes a blue-ringed octopus deadly, also protects Taricha newts—but we don't understand how they produce it, or what purposes it serves for them. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-female-toxin-producing-newts-poisonous-males.html Plants & Animals Ecology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 00:00:01 EST news620299848 Vampire bats may soon take up residence in the United States and bring with them an ancient pathogen. "What we found was that the distribution of vampire bats has moved northward across time due to past climate change, which has corresponded with an increase in rabies cases in many Latin American countries," said Paige Van de Vuurst, a Ph.D. student in Virginia Tech's Translational Biology, Medicine, and Health Graduate Program. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-links-climate-vampire-expansion-rabies.html Ecology Veterinary medicine Mon, 27 Nov 2023 16:07:40 EST news620323657 In the 50 years since monk parakeets arrived in Europe and spread across the continent, the species has developed distinct dialects that vary across countries and cities, according to a team of researchers from the Max Planck Institutes of Animal Behavior in Konstanz and for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-document-dialect-differences-parrot-european.html Plants & Animals Ecology Mon, 27 Nov 2023 14:40:03 EST news620318401 As a marine biologist, I've always found it fascinating to learn about how animals adapt to their habitat. But climate change has made it more important than ever—wild animals' futures may depend on how much we understand about them. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-stones-fish-ears-tree-theyre.html Ecology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 27 Nov 2023 13:34:04 EST news620314440 Headlamps alone illuminated the trail bisecting the Costa Rican rainforest. Having waded the black of the Tirimbina reserve so often before, Gilbert Barrantes, Laura Segura Hernández and Diego Solano Brenes knew the routine. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-silk-lines-pirate-spiders-capture.html Plants & Animals Ecology Mon, 27 Nov 2023 12:50:19 EST news620311816